Susannah McFarlane

Susannah McFarlane is best known as the author, creator and publisher of some of Australia’s most successful children’s book series, but she has also written successful non-fiction for adults including her recently released memoir Heartlines: The Year I Met My Other Mother which she co-wrote with her birth mother Robin Leuba.

She is the creator and writer of the awarding-winning EJ12 Girl Hero and EJ Spy School series, the creator and co-author of the hugely popular series for boys, Boy vs Beast, the author of the Little Mates series of alphabet books for under fives, and the series editor for Stuff Happens!, a great new series for boys about the everyday challenges they face.

Susannah, who was also the original concept creator of two of Australia’s leading tween fiction series Go Girl! and Zac Power, understands kids and loves creating stories they enjoy to read.

Her belief in the need for age-appropriate but fun content for kids comes from over twenty years experience as a children’s book publisher and from having worked with some of the world’s leading brands and writers. Susannah actually counts Thomas the Tank Engine, Winnie the Pooh, Tintin, and Enid Blyton as friends, not just former colleagues!

Susannah is the founding director of Lemonfizz Media, a boutique children’s publisher that focuses on developing a small number of publishing projects across all content platforms, and a speaker on children’s publishing for the RMIT Editing and Publishing course.

She was previously the managing director of Egmont Books UK; the vice-president of the Egmont Group; the co‐owner, managing director and publisher of Hardie Grant Egmont; a contributor to the UK trade journal Publishing News; and the Convenor of the Children’s Publishing Committee and Board Director of the Australian Publishers’ Association.